"Thunderclap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... expecting a thunderclap or some other outward token of the sudden death of Belvane's muse. Instead she was struck by the extraordinary silence of the place. She had a horrid feeling that everybody else was dead, and realising all at once that she was a very wicked little girl, she ...
— Once on a Time • A. A. Milne
... like? He had everything. He was complete. He had in his brain the sum of human faculties. He made codes like Justinian, he dictated like Caesar, his conversation was mingled with the lightning-flash of Pascal, with the thunderclap of Tacitus, he made history and he wrote it, his bulletins are Iliads, he combined the cipher of Newton with the metaphor of Mahomet, he left behind him in the East words as great as the pyramids, at Tilsit he taught Emperors majesty, at the Academy of Sciences he replied ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... nut cakes really held an assortment of firecrackers and pinwheels for which Warren Sloane had sent to town by St. Clair Donnell's father the day before, intending to have a birthday celebration that evening. The crackers went off in a thunderclap of noise and the pinwheels bursting out of the door spun madly around the room, hissing and spluttering. Anne dropped into her chair white with dismay and all the girls climbed shrieking upon their desks. Joe Sloane stood as one transfixed in the midst of the commotion and ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... him? that same verball sound Is like a thunderclap to Philips eares, Frighting my very soule. Sure you said Burbon, And to that prodegie you joynd revenge, Revenge that like a shaddow followes him. 'Twas he that made me bankrout of all blisse, Sude the divorce of that pure white and red Which deckt ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III • Various
... blessed angels, saying, 'That text in the 104th Psalm means something more; it means that God makes His angels spirits, (that is winds) and His ministers a flaming fire.' So shewing us that in those breezes there are living spirits, that God's angels guide those thunder-clouds; that the roaring thunderclap is a shock in the air truly, but that it is something more—that it is the voice of God, which shakes the cedar-trees of Lebanon, and tears down the thick bushes, and makes the wild deer slip their young. So we read in the psalms in church; that ...
— Twenty-Five Village Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... tighter, for he made sure he would be banged to death, and, for the honor of his family, he preferred to be found with his teeth locked. He was dizzy, aching, and felt shaken to pieces when something went off like a thunderclap just behind him. A hot wind knocked him senseless and red fire singed his fur. The big man had been wakened by the noise, and had fired both barrels of a shotgun into Nag just ...
— The Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... followed he found himself looking into her ardent face with a wonder not unmixed with awe. To his rather cynical view of the Fletchers such an outburst came as little less than a veritable thunderclap, and for the first time in his life he felt a need to modify his conservative theories as to the necessity of blue blood to nourish high ideals. Maria, indeed, seemed to him as she stood there, drawn fine and strong against the curtains of faded green, to hold about her something ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... invitation, that I might become his medium. I looked into his inner state, and the magnetic outward splendor disappeared, and his inner wretchedness and distress were manifest, and he could not stand any longer before me, and, with an explosion like a powerful thunderclap, he left me and took the direction to Europe. The title of my third volume, if we translate it ...
— Secret Enemies of True Republicanism • Andrew B. Smolnikar
... glad, too. Keep still, 'Phira! You must keep still, else you may be hurt. Wait. I'll take you on my lap, as Molly has 'Nias. Now—see the pretty horses?" answered Dorothy, and involuntarily shivered as a fresh thunderclap ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond
... would add: "Now, then, Tartarin!" Whereupon Tartarin of Tarascon, with crooked arms, clenched fists, and quivering nostrils, would roar three times in a formidable voice, rolling like a thunderclap in the bowels ...
— Tartarin of Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... in the little adobe like a thunderclap! A red pencil of flame streaked out between the two men. Then the smoke rolled out, dense and choking. Thud! A gun dropped to the ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... At the first thunderclap lady Margaret fell on her knees and prayed in an agony for the little soul that had gone forth into the midst of the storm. Like many women she had a horror of lightning and thunder, and it never came into her mind that she who had so loved to see the horse spout was far ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... state here the explanation, as we afterwards learned it, of this most unexpected reappearance of the enemy,—which came upon General Walker like a thunderclap, whilst he dreamed they had left him for good and all. It seems that the Vanderbilt Company, whom Walker had made enemies by ousting them from the Transit route, sent an agent (one Spencer) to the disheartened Costa Ricans, who showed them that they might easily strangle the filibuster ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... from Caspar's lip, when a crash was heard like the first bursting of a thunderclap, and then a deafening roar echoed up the ravine, mingled with louder peals, as though the eternal mountains were being ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... the gruff, sarcastic tones of Wilhelm Mencke, burst upon the lovers like an unexpected thunderclap, and, starting to her feet, Violet turned to find her sister's husband standing not ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... over the slumbering town like a thunderclap. The inhabitants in the neighbouring streets, roused from sleep by this terrible fusillade, sat up in bed, their teeth chattering with fright. Nothing in the world would have induced them to poke their noses out of the window. And slowly, athwart the ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the silence like a thunderclap, and before those present had time to turn, there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across ...
— The Lieutenant-Governor • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... That turned cheeks pale With the thought that the enemy might prevail, And the church doors snap With a thunderclap On a Christian soul in that devil's trap. But a wiser few, Who thought that they knew Cologne's Archbishop, replied, "Pooh, pooh! Just watch him and wait, And as sure as fate, You'll find that the Bishop will ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... by the child—I could not watch her for four— My brain had begun to reel—I felt I could do it no more. That was my sleeping-night, but I thought that it never would pass. There was a thunderclap once, and a clatter of hail on the glass, And there was a phantom cry that I heard as I tossed about, The motherless bleat of a lamb in the storm and the darkness without; My sleep was broken besides with dreams of the dreadful knife And fears ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... and send them the funds for the purpose, my thoughtful brother-in-law writes me word that they are coming, and that he has sent me two lads, friends of his, to take under my charge, and do the best I can for them. Why, sir, it came upon me like a thunderclap." ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn
... steadily in volume until they merged into a prolonged roll which seemed to embrace the entire heavens. At length, Vassili got up and covered over the britchka, the coachman wrapped himself up in his cloak and lifted his cap to make the sign of the cross at each successive thunderclap, and the horses pricked up their ears and snorted as though to drink in the fresh air which the flying clouds were outdistancing. The britchka began to roll more swiftly along the dusty road, and I felt uneasy, and as though the blood were coursing more quickly through my veins. Soon ...
— Boyhood • Leo Tolstoy
... Nellie's death came upon Jim Adams with the suddenness of a thunderclap. The weeks had gone by since she wrote to ask him to take Harry, with no further news of her, and after watching every post for a few days in the expectation of a black-edged envelope, he had begun to think that it was only a scare, and that she was not going to die ...
— The Girls of St. Olave's • Mabel Mackintosh
... the news of Cacama's arrest and imprisonment came like a thunderclap. He was in the habit of frequently seeing Malinche, who still retained the warm feeling of friendship for him that had originated at Tabasco, and with whom he often had long talks of their life in those days; but ...
— By Right of Conquest - Or, With Cortez in Mexico • G. A. Henty
... shout, far louder and fiercer than the first, came like a thunderclap after the King's words. It was the bay of a fierce pack to their ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... moment there came a rap at the door; it was a soft, low tap, yet it startled the viscount like a thunderclap. He dropped the hand ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... catechisms or primers. Susanna herself nodded sleepily, and indulgently allowed to pass unnoticed the jokes and teasing, by means of which we tried to keep ourselves awake. Not even the flies were buzzing, except the very small ones which are always lively, when all of a sudden the first thunderclap sounded and reverberated, crashing and roaring, among the worm-eaten rafters of the old, dilapidated house. In the most desperate combination, such as only occurs during storms in the north, a clatter of hail ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... was the consternation, which reigned that day at Raynham Castle. Already Sir Oswald's guests had been making hasty arrangements for their departure; and many visitors had departed even before the discovery of that awful event, which came like a thunderclap upon all within ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... passed onward, then swept back again rustling, then came a roll of thunder closer than the last. Another pause—fateful it seemed, as though the garden trembled before the coming storm. A white flash played intermittently upon the fountain, followed by a thunderclap directly overhead, and a torrent of rain poured down. The Duke stood still a moment, the rain beating upon him. The storm delighted him, it answered to his tempestuous mood. He turned away from ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... increased. In the autumn of that year Savonarola delivered a famous course of sermons on Noah's Ark, warning all to take refuge from the coming flood in the mystical Ark of mercy. The flood came indeed, for suddenly all Florence was startled as if by a thunderclap by the news that a foreign army was pouring over the Alps for the conquest of Italy. The terror was overwhelming. Italy was unprepared, for the princes had no efficient ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... his shoulders; then comes another and hoists the first; and so on, until the one holding the spirit can lift him into Bullimah. As the spirit is hoisted in, one of the Mooroobeaigunnil, knocks the lowest one in the ladder of spirits down; thud to the earth come the rest, making a sound like a thunderclap, which the far away tribes hear, and ...
— The Euahlayi Tribe - A Study of Aboriginal Life in Australia • K. Langloh Parker
... fell. The enemy's trenches were about a thousand yards away, and their guns were busy in the night, so that the shells came overhead, and lads who had heard the owls hoot in English woods now heard stranger night-birds crying through the air, with the noise of rushing wings, ending in a thunderclap. ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... a thunderclap on a moonlit night. It was sudden tempest prefaced by the lull of perfect calm. It was the signal to combat sounded when peace seemed assured. The young man perceived now how much of his early zeal had deserted ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... we came across That dreadful common, called the Moss, 'Midst wind and rain, and tempest tossed— And thunderclap I did begin to fear thy ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... usury which prevailed at Madras, thought it necessary to interfere, and to order all interests to be lowered to ten per cent. This order, which contained no exception, though it by no means pointed particularly to this class of debts, came like a thunderclap on the Nabob. He considered his political credit as ruined; but to find a remedy to this unexpected evil, he again added to the old principal twenty per cent interest accruing for the last year. Thus a new fund was formed; and it was on that accumulation of various principals, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... anguish had its first beginnings; it had waxed and gathered strength, it had matured and concentrated, until it had taken the form of a fearful, frenzied and fantastic question, which tortured his heart and mind, clamouring insistently for an answer. Now his mother's letter had burst on him like a thunderclap. It was clear that he must not now suffer passively, worrying himself over unsolved questions, but that he must do something, do it at once, and do it quickly. Anyway he must decide on something, ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... left Calcutta late in March, 1862; at Malta they parted never to meet again in this world. Lord Canning proceeded to England, and Yule joined his wife and child in Rome. Only a few weeks later, at Florence, came as a thunderclap the announcement of Lord Canning's unexpected death in London, on 17th June. Well does the present writer remember the day that fatal news came, and Yule's deep anguish, not assuredly for the loss of his prospects, but for the loss of a most noble and magnanimous friend, a statesman ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... annexation of Bosnia, could not possibly submit a second time to the Caudine Forks. She laid her hand upon her sword hilt. Germany sprang to the side of her ally. France ranged herself with Russia. Like a thunderclap the war of ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... from him. But—what did they expect to get from him? He had been a little perplexed by their attitude when he asked them if they expected him to carry a lot of money on him—a fugitive. Was it possible—the thought came to him like a thunderclap in the darkness—that they knew, or had some idea, of what he really had on him? That Miss Pett had drugged him every night he now felt sure—well, then, in that case how did he know that she hadn't entered his room and searched his belongings, and ...
— The Borough Treasurer • Joseph Smith Fletcher
... and beef served in style on a pack-bag," also regretting empty mail-bags—the Southern mail having been delayed en route. Tam and the Sanguine Scot accepted invitations to the Christmas dinner; and the Wet broke in one terrific thunderclap, as the heavens, opening, ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... Thunderclap after thunderclap announced ever-fresh legions pressing into the sky and obscuring the sun. It seemed as if the earth were cowering in their presence, as a partridge cowers before the hovering hawk. The blackthorn and juniper bushes called to caution with a low, swishing noise; the ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... his negroes to issue an order. But it was never issued. At that moment a terrific rolling thunderclap drowned his voice and shook the very air. Colonel Bishop jumped, his negroes jumped with him, and so even did the apparently imperturbable Mr. Blood. Then the four of ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... of light shone plainly at the top of the stairs. Someone was coming down. Ricky's breath was warm on Val's cheek and she moved with a faint crackling of her cape which sounded as loud as a thunderclap ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... railroads had been swallowed whole by the Pacific Southwestern had fallen as a thunderclap upon the rank and file of the three local companies; and since, in railway practice, a change of owners usually carries with it a sweeping change in department heads, the service ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... a thunderclap," the Archduchess answered quickly. "For years we had lost all trace of you. Besides, there were reasons—you know that there were reasons why I might surely have been forgiven for hesitating. But let that go. We had better ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... positively, that I may go as far as Geneva. In any case, let it be well impressed on everyone that I shall not be absent more than a fortnight. If anything unusual happens I shall return like a thunderclap. I commend to your keeping all the great interests of France; and I hope you will soon hear of me by way of ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... evenly as though nothing in the least extraordinary had occurred. The incident was closed—that abrupt swoop of terror and impending death dropping down there from out the darkness, cutting abruptly athwart the gayety of the moment, come and gone with the swiftness of a thunderclap. Many of the women had gone home, taking their men with them; but the great bulk of the crowd still remained, seeing no reason why the episode should interfere with the evening's enjoyment, resolved to ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... in pacifying her. The letters were evidence that Edith and himself believed that Althea was in Galloway at the time. Maria's denial had come upon them like a thunderclap, bewildering, stunning. If Althea was not ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... But best of all was for the parties to be married outright, by a justice of the peace, without a word of public warning, and then to enjoy the pleasure of outwitting the neighbors, and coming down like a thunderclap on a social sunshine unsuspicious of banns, which had been published on some three literally public days, but when nobody was hearing. That was something worth doing, and very ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... knows, the declaration of war was not long in coming, and the news came like a thunderclap to all in Kimberley, where those who had been in doubt as to the wisdom of the preparations previously made were the loudest in finding fault because ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... support him in his hours of negation, nothing to force him to go on. He goes on as a matter of habit: he knows not whither he is going. His powers are scattered, his consciousness is obscured. It is an awful thing for him if, just at the moment when he is most asleep, there comes a thunderclap to break in upon his somnambulism! Then he ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... that both had said the same thing. Two uprights flashed up above their heads—the arm of the priest making the sign of the cross, and the sabre of the commander of the shooters, glistening at the same instant. . . . A dry, dull thunderclap, followed by ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... storm swelled to the roaring of an awful sea, the wind grew to a shrill long scream, the elm-tree was riven and split with the crash of a thunderclap. To Lucian the tumult and the shock came as a gentle murmur, as if a brake stirred before a sudden breeze in summer. And then ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen
... there, shaketh the fateful shaft, And, following up its fate with eyes, afar the steel doth waft 920 With all the might his body hath: no stone the wall-sling bears E'er roars so loud: no thunderclap with such a crashing tears Amid the heaven: on flew the spear, huge as the whirlwind black, And speeding on the dreadful death: it brings to utter wrack The hauberk's skirt and outer rim of that seven-folded shield, And goeth grating through the thigh: then falleth unto ...
— The AEneids of Virgil - Done into English Verse • Virgil
... that Sophia had been the most excellent mistress that servant ever had. The doctor angrily told her not to stand blubbering there, but to go into her kitchen and shut the door if she couldn't control herself. All his accumulated nervous agitation was discharged on Maud like a thunderclap. Constance continued to behave wonderfully. She was the admiration of the doctor and Lily Holl. Then Dick Povey came back. It was settled that Lily should pass the night with Constance. At last the doctor and Dick departed together, ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... and sweeter fell the music upon his ear, till suddenly, like the silence after a thunderclap, the organ ceased to roll, the choir was silent, and out of the quiet rose a single voice—that of Laurence the Scot singing in a tenor of infinite sweetness ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... extinguished. I bump into a stone, and kick it to one side purely physically. I put it to one side for fear some one will stumble upon it, intelligently; I respond to a meaning which the thing has. I am startled by a thunderclap whether I recognize it or not—more likely, if I do not recognize it. But if I say, either out loud or to myself, that is thunder, I respond to the disturbance as a meaning. My behavior has a mental quality. When things have a meaning ...
— Democracy and Education • John Dewey
... carrying Wynston, or laying him in the bed," continued Marston, who spoke rather like one pursuing a horrible reverie, than as a man relating facts to a listener, "I heard a light tread, and soft breathing in the lobby. A thunderclap would have stunned me less that minute. I moved softly, holding my breath, to the door. I believe, in moments of strong excitement, men hear more acutely than at other times; but I thought I heard the rustling of a gown, going from the door again. I waited—it ceased; I waited until ...
— The Evil Guest • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... weapons, covering the wide expanse of the firmament. Then the winds, making a loud roar and agitating all the oceans, brought together masses of clouds in the sky, charged with torrents of rain. Those masses of clouds began to vomit thunder and terrible flashes of lightning charged with the thunderclap. Then Arjuna possessing a knowledge of means, hurled the excellent weapon called Vayavya with proper mantras to dispel those clouds. With that weapon the energy and force of Indra's thunderbolt and ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... but in the tomb-like stillness a thunderclap could not have been more distinct. The hail, however, produced no response. The angered Vose drew his Winchester to a level, with his finger on the trigger, but when he ran his eye along the barrel, he failed to perceive any target. He lowered the muzzle a few inches and peered over ...
— A Waif of the Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... exert itself, it seemed to awake to the reality of its position. Making a lively rush, that seemed tremendously inconsistent with its weight, it shot over the edge of a yawning crevasse, burst with a thunderclap on the opposite ice-cliff, and went roaring into the dark bowels of the glacier, whence the echoes of its tumbling masses, subdued by distance, came up like the mutterings ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... is made up. I will speak as soon as I have seen Zinca Klork. The poor girl must be told with consideration. The death of her betrothed must not come upon her like a thunderclap. Yes! To-morrow, as soon as we ...
— The Adventures of a Special Correspondent • Jules Verne
... and it was he who had sent him the exploded cartridge. The news came to Alec like a thunderclap, for the Turkana were the best part of his fighting force, and he had always placed the utmost reliance on their fidelity. The chief said that he could not hold in his young men, and not only must Alec cease to count upon them, but they would probably insist ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... and construct myths of Phoebus, nor can we seriously picture the moon descending to dally with Endymion. We can no longer see Hamadryads in the oaks or Naiads in the streams. We do not hear Zeus or Thor in the thunderclap, nor recognize in volcanic eruptions the struggles of imprisoned Titans breathing flame. But what of that? Does the essence of poetry lie at all in myths and superstitions? Because we know of what the sun is made, and how many miles distant he is, do we find his risings and settings less moving ...
— Platform Monologues • T. G. Tucker
... would have jumped from an adder, but she did not spring far—not, indeed, beyond arm's length—and then, quick as thought, she raised her little hand and dealt him a box on the ear with such right goodwill that it sounded among the trees like a miniature thunderclap. ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... in the Wilson camp, when like a thunderclap out of a clear sky broke the story of the disagreement between Colonel Harvey, Marse Henry Watterson, and the Governor of New Jersey. I recall my conversation with Governor Wilson on the day following the Harvey- Watterson conference at a New York club. As ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... night in our sophomore club when the news came like a thunderclap that one of our members had been killed pole-vaulting at a track meet in New York. It was our habit, in our new-found manliness, to eat with our hats on, shout and sing, and speak of our food as "tapeworm," "hemorrhage," and the like. I remember how we sat that night, silent, ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... printed, stitched, and ready for distribution in June; but it was thought better to wait a little, for fear of accidents, and especially for the purpose of using it instantly after the first reverse should occur, and thus to give it the force of prophecy. The Battle of Waterloo came like a thunderclap. The article was suppressed, and one on "Gall and his Craniology" substituted. "I think," says Ticknor, "Southey said he had seen the repudiated article." [Footnote: "Life, Letters, and Journals of George Ticknor ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... OF ATTENTION.—Attention may be secured in three ways: (1) It is demanded by some sudden or intense sensory stimulus or insistent idea, or (2) it follows interest, or (3) it is compelled by the will. If it comes in the first way, as from a thunderclap or a flash of light, or from the persistent attempt of some unsought idea to secure entrance into the mind, it is called involuntary attention. This form of attention is of so little importance, comparatively, in our mental life that we shall not ...
— The Mind and Its Education • George Herbert Betts
... negotiating with them, deceiving and being deceived in his turn. The consequence of all this was a great, thick cloud, wherein the Frondeurs themselves were at last involved; but which they burst with a thunderclap. ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... came in later and said the whole thing was to him like a thunderclap—as it was to her poor father. To me it followed closely on the presentiment that in some measure prepared me for it. Here I sit with empty hands. I have had the little coffin in my arms, but my ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... reluctance in making known his discoveries to his wife as Claud had before him; for he well knew how deeply they would disquiet her. But, soon concluding there would be no wisdom in attempting concealment, he told her what he had heard. As he had anticipated, the news fell like a sudden thunderclap on her heart. She had experienced, indeed, many strange misgivings respecting her son's late mysterious absences; but she was not prepared for such a double portion of ill-omened news as she deemed this ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... explanation, the names of every girl who had attended Cora's spread—save Cora herself—and ordered that they be deprived of recreation, as had Nancy, "for being out of their dormitories after hours." The blow fell like a thunderclap upon ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe
... ugly. I like fair play as well as any man. But it can't be done. There must be a surprise, a coup de main, as the French say" (poor Crossthwaite was always quoting French in those days). "Once show our strength—burst upon the tyrants like a thunderclap; and then!— ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... Jameson had started, in spite of these messages, came on the Reformers like a thunderclap. They were not ready—they had not sufficient arms to fight with, and they were not of one mind. The doing had been easy enough, and they had fancied the undoing would be as simple. They had laid their gunpowder train without thinking of the number of firebrands ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... falls on the wood in thuds, "God, God." The cry of the rook, "God," answers it The crack of the fire on the hearth, the voice of the brook, say the same name; All things, dog, cat, fiddle, baby, Wind, breaker, sea, thunderclap Repeat in ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... one of their, I might really say august, number. You took your honors in precisely the spirit I should have expected of you—sweetly, modestly, without any undue sense of pride or hateful self-righteousness. Then, a few days ago, there came a thunderclap; and teachers and girls were alike amazed to find that you were no longer a member. By the rules of the club we were not ...
— Betty Vivian - A Story of Haddo Court School • L. T. Meade
... only as flatter their wishes, conceive that the contest is at an end and that to regulate the government and police of their own State is all that remains to be done, but it is devoutly to be wished that a sad reverse of this may not fall upon them like a thunderclap that is little expected. I do not mean to designate particular States. I wish to cast no reflections upon any one. The public believe (and if they do believe it, the fact might almost as well be ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... up the cry, 'Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord,' there follows, swift as the thunderclap on the lightning flash, the rousing summons, 'Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem!' Wheresoever it is obeyed there will follow in due time the joyful chorus, as in this ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... succeed nowadays must make a boom with something, it matters not what. For years I've been experimenting in secret, and some day I will show them further results of my researches—and they will come upon the profession like a thunderclap, staggering belief." ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... storm itself was a parable. Those zigzag ribbons of purple fire, the fierce shouting of the thunderclap that followed! In all the wide forest-tracts over which the tempest hung, all that grim artillery did but rend and split some one tough tree. Rather it turned again to gladden the earth, and the tears ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... shouted Dick, rounding on him with a fierceness which astonished himself. It was a show to see the way in which Gosse collapsed under this thunderclap of righteous indignation. He looked round at Dick out of the corners of his eyes, very much as a small dog contemplates the boot that has just helped him half-way across the road, and positively forgot to ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... encouraged me, and I began to be a little cheerful; but I was knocked down again as with a thunderclap, when turning to the captain's wife, and discoursing of me, she said to her, "Sister, I cannot but think my lady to be very much like such a person." Then she named the person, and the captain's wife said she thought so too. The girl replied ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... silver stars from heaven in showers, Rived adamant to show an azure gap, Captured the very Psyche in my cap, Filched from the sack of Time six diamond hours. Hyperborean in my crown of flowers I ran and leapt the cliff of thunderclap Plunging through green sea-light where bronze fronds wrap Crumbling ...
— Perpetual Light • William Rose Benet
... signed in the kitchen, and it was there that the revelation took place which came as a thunderclap of surprise to everyone concerned, except Jervis and Mr. Clay, the latter of whom, when the bishop's part of the ceremony was done, took the remainder upon himself, and proceeded to make his explanations in a voice which Mary declared made her ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... on June 22nd, the excommunication by Pope Alessandro VI. (Borgia) fell like a thunderclap, and the Medicean youths marched in triumphant procession with torches and secular music to burlesque the Laudi; no doubt Albertinelli was one of these, while Baccio grieved among the awestruck friars ...
— Fra Bartolommeo • Leader Scott (Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora Kendrick)
... and the silence came again. It seemed long, and weighed on me like a thunderstorm in the air, nor should I have started had the whole assembly broken into one thunderclap of hatred of me. But instead of that, came the calm voice of Ealhstan ...
— A Thane of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... the thunderclap. "Gweng says Bad people told you bofe Lies heaps longer ago than dolly's birfday, so you bofe thort you was dead and buried." Straight to the heart of the subject, as perhaps none but a child could ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... crowds that resorted to him his last paternal admonitions. He continued without interruption till mid-day, and at that hour precisely, turning to the lay-brother that assisted him, said, "Shortly a thunderclap will lay me prostrate on the ground, you will have to raise me thence, but this is the last I shall experience." Accordingly, at two hours and a half after sunset, an apoplectic stroke threw him on the ground. At ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... slump came all were heavily committed to the bull side. It was a bad slump. It was so unexpected—by the lambs—that all of them said, very gravely, it came like a thunderclap out of a clear sky. While it lasted, that is, while the shearing of the flock was proceeding, it was very uncomfortable. Those same joyous, winning stock-gamblers, with beaming faces, of the week before, ...
— The Tipster - 1901, From "Wall Street Stories" • Edwin Lefevre
... I already knew. We had luncheon in the Della Robbia room at the Vanderbilt and I was digging the marrons out of a Nesselrode when, presto, it suddenly came over me that the baroness was right and that I could never marry a foreigner. It came like a thunderclap. But somewhere in that senate of instinct which debates over such things down deep in the secret chambers of our souls, I suppose, the whole problem had been talked over and fought out and put to the vote. And in the face of the fact that Theobald Gustav had always ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer
... becoming a musician; and until he was twenty-two or twenty-three years old his weak will sulkily gave way to their wishes. In obedience to his father he began his studies in medicine at Paris. One evening he heard Les Danaides of Salieri. It came upon him like a thunderclap. He ran to the Conservatoire library and read ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... put this query to himself, Juve shook from head to foot. Like a thunderclap he thought he grasped the truth he had followed so eagerly. What had become of Lady Beltham? Must he not come to the conclusion that this woman whose face had been crushed out of all recognition by the murderer ...
— The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantmas" Detective Tales • mile Souvestre and Marcel Allain
... word that had been spoken, where every tone had been wrong, every gesture false, and it fell on the company like a thunderclap. John Storm drew his breath hard, looked up at Lord Robert by a strange impulse, ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... heard dogs barking, and supposed that my boy Mnason was amusing himself in the chase as usual, and had penetrated into the copse with his friends. However, that was not it: presently there was an earthquake; I heard a voice like a thunderclap, and saw a terrible woman approaching, not much less than three hundred feet high. She carried a torch in her left hand, and a sword in her right; the sword might be thirty feet long. Her lower extremities were ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... impugner of his own profession delivered these two last words in thunder so sudden and effective as to strike Julia's work out of her hands. But here, as in Nature, a moment's pause followed the thunderclap; so Mrs. Dodd, who had long been patiently watching her opportunity, smothered a shriek, and edged in a word: "This is irresistible; you have confuted everybody, to their heart's content; and now the question is, what course ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... suffered much. The knowledge that Hawdon had not been drowned as she had supposed, had come to her like a thunderclap. And the news of his death, following so soon after this discovery, had unnerved her. She felt Mr. Tulkinghorn's suspicious eyes watching her always and began to tremble in dread of what ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... instant that an ear-splitting crash of thunder resounded about us; there was a violent concussion; and when, a few seconds later, I recovered from the stunning and stupefying effect of that terrific thunderclap, it was to become aware that the foremast was over the side, and the stump of it fiercely ablaze. There was no necessity to pipe all hands, for the watch below now came tumbling up on deck, alarmed at the shock; and in a few minutes we had the buckets passing along. Fortunately we were able ...
— A Pirate of the Caribbees • Harry Collingwood
... sight was shown me, there and then,— Me, one out of a world of men, Singled forth, as the chance might hap To another if, in a thunderclap Where I heard noise and you saw flame, Some one man knew God called his name. For me, I think I said, "Appear! Good were it to be ever here. If thou wilt, let me build to thee Service-tabernacles three, ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... favored him. His mother's reputation for wealth, the knowledge that he was her sole heir, the high position of the family, shielded him from suspicion. Then came the thunderclap. He was caught in the act of "dealing a second" in the English Club, and driven from the club as a blackleg. Other reverses followed: a public refusal on the part of an officer to play cards with him, followed by a like refusal to give him satisfaction in a duel; a second occasion in ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... The thunderclap of the European war shattered the uneasy calm in China, not because the Chinese knew anything of the mighty issues which were to be fought out with such desperation and valour, but because the presence of the German colony of Kiaochow on Chinese soil and the activity of ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... non-expectation; false expectation &c (disappointment) 509; miscalculation &c 481. surprise, sudden burst, thunderclap, blow, shock, start; bolt out of the blue; wonder &c 870; eye opener. unpleasant surprise, pleasant surprise. V. not expect &c 507; be taken by surprise; start; miscalculate &c 481; not bargain ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... was watched and on the third day of June was seen to go in the early morning to the unholy spot with certain instruments. There he was observed going through strange and diabolical conjurations, when there came suddenly another thunderclap and the said Henri Lothiere did vanish entirely from view in that moment. This fact is attested ...
— The Man Who Saw the Future • Edmond Hamilton
... through the room a thunderclap of memory. There had been words drawled there the night before that now detonated in Ellen's mind.... "What am I to do, Ellen, to keep my sons from quarrelling ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... marched into the light. He stood now almost at the forward poop rail, with his arms raised above his head; and he sent his voice forward in a stentorian hail, a cry that was like a thunderclap. ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... shortly. "I couldn't myself. I'd have given the lie to anybody who had dared so much as to hint at it. It was like a thunderclap to me." ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... whispered, pink to the tips of his ears, wrapped in the rosy mystery of first love. "I didn't know; I didn't think—it came like a thunderclap." ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... wife!" The sentence was like a thunderclap in the ears of Madame des Ursins, so long accustomed as she had been to govern and domineer. Where to find one—one like Marie Louise of Savoy, who would consent to retain her in the same functions, and who, like her, with intelligence and ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... suddenly burst upon Prosper like a thunderclap. He wrung his hands despairingly, ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... done well. I wish my presence here to be like a thunderclap to him. And then I expect that in his terror he will make the avowal which will ...
— The Son of Monte Cristo • Jules Lermina
... storm cloud had swept up over the horizon behind them, and the sky overhead was blotted now with its black. They had not seen it nor heeded the distant flashing of lightning. A sudden thunderclap startled them now into consciousness of the scene about them. The wind rushed on them from behind. The sea was rising rapidly; ...
— The Fire People • Ray Cummings
... totally unprepared for the girl's timid avowal. To Wrayson, however, after the first mild shock of surprise, it was of no special import. To Sydney Barnes, although he made a speedy effort to grapple with the situation, it came very much as a thunderclap. ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... salute sounded—shattering out like a thunderclap over the jungle. Then challenger and ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... showed slate-hued, with pallid feathers of cloud driven across. Lightning tore it, the thunder was loud, the trees upon the hilltops began to move. Some raindrops fell, large, slow, and warm. The lightning ran again, blindingly bright; the ensuing thunderclap seemed to shake the rock. As it died, the cataract sound of the wind was heard among the ranked trees. The ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... the moment that small-pox was declared, the princes had not been admitted to Meudon. The Duchess of Burgundy alone had occasionally seen the king. All were living in confident expectation of a speedy convalescence; the news of the death came upon them like a thunderclap. All the courtiers thronged together at once, the women half dressed, the men anxious and concerned, some to conceal their extreme sorrow, others their joy, according as they were mixed up in the different cabals of the court. "It was all, however, nothing but a transparent veil," says St. ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... against which she was powerless: what could she do against her plainness? There was no doubt about it. The certainty of her misfortune had suddenly been revealed to her one day when she was looking at herself in the mirror; it came like a thunderclap. Of course she exaggerated the evil, and saw her nose as ten times larger than it was; it seemed to her to fill all her face; she dared not show herself; she wished to die. But there is in youth such a power of hope that these fits of discouragement never lasted long: ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... promontory, the weird, giant chestnut tree, the open plateau, and beyond, the stormy heavens, were all luridly clear in the flash of lightning. She fancied it was possible to see a tall, dark figure emerging from the thicket. As the thunderclap rolled and pealed overhead, she strained her eyes into the blackness waiting for ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... boy with a pang that he should never be able to recall it again in its entirety. For the genius of modern progress is contemptuous of old landmarks and impatient of delays. And swift as its race is elsewhere, it is only in that part of the South which has become "industrial" that it came as a thunderclap, with all the intermediate and accelerative steps taken at a bound. Men spoke of it as "the boom." It was not that. It was merely that the spirit of modernity had discovered a hitherto overlooked corner of the field, and made haste ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... his owne land, and there he ordayned lawes and statutes, which the Tartars doe most strictly and inuiolably obserue, of the which we haue before spoken. [Sidenote: The death of Chingis. His sonnes.] He was afterward slaine by a thunderclap. He had foure sonnes: the first was called Occoday, the second Thossut Can, the third Thiaday: the name of the fourth is vnknowen. From these foure descended all the dukes of the Mongals. [Sidenote: His graund children.] The first ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt |
